The Everywhereist

The walkway to Linderhof Palace, Bavaria.

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Do you ever get the feeling that you’ve forgotten something?

It’s a sensation I absolutely hate, and I think that’s part of the reason why I’m always doomed to feel that way. I can’t leave the house without being convinced that I forgot to put something important in my purse (like my wallet or my phone or the emergency granola bar that I keep eating and needing to replace). Or that I left my straightening iron plugged in, or the iron on, or I somehow managed to set the kitchen on fire and it’s now engulfed in flames that I failed to notice as I waltzed out the front door.

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Not Pictured: Linderhof Castle

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Rand and I did not realize what the building was when we first came across it.

We were heading to Linderhof castle in Bavaria, and when we saw the giant green dome emerge between the mountains, lovely and imposing, we figured that was it.

It was only once we were inside that we realized it wasn’t the castle, and even then, we weren’t clear on where we were.

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Mmm ... "mit hackfleisch!"

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I’m not a big shopper.

Hold on just a sec, will you? My husband is reading over my shoulder, and has started laughing so hysterically at my opening sentence that I need to make sure he’s not gonna hyperventilate.

Yeah, apparently, he’s fine. The jerk.

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When I am hungry while traveling, things go downhill very quickly.

I become snappy and irritable and overly-sensitive. In a town like Munich, this can be problematic, because German isn’t exactly a delicate sounding language to begin with. Even when folks are being courteous (which they often are in Bavaria), I want to respond to them in one of two ways, depending on my level of hunger:

1.) Weep.

2.) Scream, “OH, YEAH? Well ‘ENTSCHULDIGUNG’ TO YOU, TOO, ASSHOLE.”

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This is how it begins.

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I have a bladder the size of a chipmunk’s.

No, no – stop praising me on how amazing this is. How it’s so ladylike and really quite Hollywood to have a bladder so svelte and small. That Angelina’s or Gwyneth’s is probably barely bigger than my own.

Because despite how glamorous it sounds, let me tell you: having an itsy-bitsy bladder is NOT as amazing as movies and TV would have you believe. It means that much of my and Rand’s travels are interrupted with side-quests to find toilets. That before we go anywhere – a flight, a drive, a short walk, or even if we are simply moving from the dining room to the living room – I need to run to the bathroom.

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Bavarian food doesn’t f#ck around.

Bavarian food is the guy at the gym in the tiny muscle tee who’s lifting weights so heavy, the veins in his neck and head (and other parts of the body that you didn’t even know HAD veins) start to pop out.

Bavaria‘s cuisine is a monster truck. It crumples the delicate-by-comparison culinary offerings of Spain, Italy, and France like tiny little Fiats and Peugots in its path.

Do you want to eat Bavarian food? OF COURSE YOU DO. It is rich and doughy and filling and is the only thing on the planet that can soak up German beer. Every other fare will simply hide in the corner of your stomach, petrified at the sheer awesomeness of the brew that resides in there with it, and it will never get digested.

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Before I tell you about the Deutsches Museum, I need to tell you about one of my greatest fears.

I am terrified that one day, I will be either 1.) abducted by aliens or 2.) frozen in some sort of cryogenic state and thawed out thousands of years in the future.

This is not the terrifying part. No. The terrifying part is when I am asked (by either aliens or mankind’s tentacle-y descendants) about the world in which I lived, and I have NOT A SINGLE ANSWER TO GIVE THEM.

I mean, I have no idea how things work. Like, not even remotely. I don’t really know where computers come from (elves, maybe?) or how they operate (wires have something to do with it, I think. And then you push electricity through the wires and – voila! – INTERNET.)

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I hope you aren’t yet sick of hearing about our trip to Germany. I still need to tell you about the rest of that Europe excursion – we went to London and Madrid, too – as well as our jaunt to Vegas from which we’ve just returned (in a word, AMAZING. And this comes from a girl who hates Vegas). But right now, I’m not yet done thinking about Bavaria. The place is just too darn pretty – and we had too much fun – for me to get it out of my head. So I hope you don’t mind if I dwell on it, just a little bit longer.

Then I’ll you about churros and Spitalfields and neon lights and the rest of it. I promise.

But in the meantime, here are ten pictures from our trip.

1. The Neues Rathaus (New Town Hall) in downtown Munich:

One of my favorite places to pee in downtown Munich also happens to be in this building (relax: it's in a bathroom.)

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